Tony Mowbray says he’s delighted to see Coventry City start turning their results around and climbing up the League One table.

The former Sky Blues boss is enjoying his time out of the game and insists he has no regrets about walking away at the end of September after a ten game winless start to the new campaign.

“I’ve been watching the results and seen that they’ve picked up and are doing really well,” said the 52-year-old, who had 18 months at the Ricoh Arena before his long-time sidekick Mark Venus took over the helm, overseeing an impressive run of seven wins, two draws and two defeats in all competitions.

“It’s good to see and good for Veno who I have been with for a long, long time. I’m delighted for him and delighted for the team to be honest. There are a lot of young players there and it’s still a very young side but they’re winning a few games.”

Asked if he thought things would eventually click into place for the Sky Blues, he said: “Bottom line it’s difficult when you’re putting a whole new team together every season. We’d got a new centre-half, Willis back in, two new full-backs on loan, no Fleck or Vincelot, new strikers – it was thrown together really and you can’t expect them to click straight away by winning every match.

John Fleck crosses the ball.

“I said many times that I enjoyed working with the team and enjoyed the work, trying to improve them and yet we just couldn’t turn tight matches into victories, that’s all.

“They’re doing that at the moment, which is really good for them, and all the while they’re working hard they will get their rewards in the end, I’m sure.”

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He added: “I thought we were a good team in this league and apart from Bury – and this is how stupid this league is – they were probably the best team we played. They were the strongest, most athletic and yet they’ve lost seven league games on the bounce. So going from being one of the strongest physically this year, they can’t win a match now and yet we didn’t lose to them, did all right against them and were competitive.

“But I wasn’t there to be competitive, I wanted to get out of the league, to win promotion. I didn’t want to be a League One manager for long.

Coventry's manager Tony Mowbray

“You look at the table and if you win three on the bounce you can be in the top six, lose three on the bounce and you’re down the bottom again. That’s the league to be honest, embarrassingly tight really. But I think the Championship’s the same.”

So no regrets then?

“No, it was the right thing for me to do for me and my family at the time, and it might have been the right thing for Coventry, particularly with the transition to Mark who knows exactly how I have worked over the last 18 months, so I’m sure it’s been a pretty smooth transition,” said Mogga.

Gary Pallister

As for how he’s spending his time these days, it’s clear that family comes first as well as being able to catch up with a few old mates, not least his former central defensive partner Gary Pallister from their Middlesbrough playing days.

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“I do the school run, have a cup of coffee with Gary Pallister most mornings, talking about footy and life – taking it easy really, relaxing and enjoying it,” said the former West Brom, Celtic and Middlesbrough boss.

(Picture) Gary Pallister climbs high watched by admiring skipper Tony Mowbray in their FA Cup 3rd round home tie against Grimsby Town which they lost 2-1.7th January 1989

“Hopefully another opportunity will come around, I have had some interesting conversations with a few people over the last four or five weeks.

“I don’t know how long it’s been, five weeks down the line, and I’m ready to go again now.”